university at eighteen, and afterwards to a training college, she will be twenty-three before she begins practical teaching, and that is much too late. As a proof of this argument, we may state that inspectors of elementary schools sometimes find that a pupil-teacher at the end of her preparatory course at the pupil teachers' centre-drawing our illustration from the system of the London School Board - is a far better practical teacher than when she comes away from the two years' course at a training college which follows the four or five years' preparatory work. During those two years she has lost touch with actual pupils, and it sometimes takes her very many months to regain it. It has been observed, too, that in talking to a young elementary teacher about her work, she will betray intense interest in "her children"-i.e., her pupils: a like sympathetic interest is often lacking in young secondary teachers.

there is not time for anything beyond their daily work. Whatever means we take of training them, we should endeavour to dispel that idea. The best teachers are undoubtedly those who care for things besides teaching; and it is extraordinary what a cultivating, civilising influence such women have on their pupils—even on the minds of average, not to say dull, girls. The fact that girls who go to secondary schools do not always come from cultivated or enlightened homes is not sufficiently kept in view. It may happen that in a class of girls ranging in age from fifteen to eighteen, several will not have read or heard of incidents as notorious as England's difficulties in the Transvaal or in Venezuela; others again may not have access in their homes to the most ordinary book of reference, or to any standard volume of history or poetry. It is with such girls and their parents that the teachers have to reckon—a fact that women fresh from the university and the training college are too apt to lose sight of. The decentralisation advocated in Sir John Gorst's bill would, if adopted, have done something to remove that difficulty. A very different curriculum and method of education is required in schools of the same character in different districts. It is quite possible that a system which works well at South Kensington will be less successful at Brixton. It is therefore of the greatest importance that teachers should take into account the social position, the ability, and the general environment of their pupils, things that can only be learnt by practical experience and some knowledge of the world. That capacity in a teacher, again, is not always obtainable in a training college.

Another objection to training colleges is that very often, from the nature of the work done and the kind of teachers usually employed in them, they scarcely promote in the students an interest in outside things, in current events, for example, or in general literature, art, and science. It is of the greatest importance that teachers should have outside interests, the more and the wider the better. The present headmaster of Harrow once said that schoolmastering was of necessity a somewhat narrowing profession, because it chiefly consisted in telling other people what to do. For that reason he advised his assistants to do something outside their work-to travel, or to write books. Among women teachers there is far too great a tendency to narrow their interests, and to think that

women teachers obtaining a university degree.

The second qualification required by the council is a certificate in the theory and practice of education. This badge of distinction is again no absolute proof of efficiency. Educational experts are not yet agreed whether a technical training is a necessity. That some sort of preparation is advisable is allowed by most, but what form it should take is still an open question. Training colleges offer obvious points of attack. On some minds a system of routine has a crushing and depressing effect: a knowledge of the theory of education, of metaphysics, of psychology, of hard-andfast rules of method, is not invariably helpful to the practice of teaching. It has been observed that a teacher who has been trained at a training college is able to do a particular thing in a particular way; but if when she begins work in a school as regular teacher the head-mistress suggests that it might be well to employ a different method from that practised in the training school, she is often unwilling, if not unable, to answer the call. Another defect is to be found in the kind of practice in actual teaching obtainable by the students of a training college. It is mostly of a fictitious character: teaching in the so called practising schools attached to some of the institutions, isolated visits to schools to take a class in them, cannot teach the art of managing classes, throws no light on the details of the successful working of a school, does not aid in develop

a

ing resource-one of the most important and most necessary qualities of the teacher-and gives her judges and critics little or no opportunity of discovering how her personality and influence impress themselves on her pupils. The importance of character and moral force in a teacher cannot be rated too highly; it has even been said that in a day-school it is of no importance, but that is surely a fallacy. Young people imitate unconsciously the tone and bearing of those who are set over them, and from the general demeanour of a class in a school, a fairly correct judgment may always be formed of the character of the mistress at its head. What we want to know about a teacher is what is the result of her work from a mental and moral standpoint on the children under her care. In order that such result shall be satisfactory, those who intend to become teachers cannot begin too early to teach, to come into personal contact with the taught, to learn to know them, their wants and needs, and to sympathise with their difficulties and limitations. To do this effectively, more years of practice and experience are needed than life in a training college ordinarily guarantees.

It has often struck us that, as a body, the elementary women teachers, whatever their comparative deficiencies in scholarship or higher culture, are, as practical teachers, superior to the secondary teachers. The reason of the superiority is to be sought in the fact that the elementary teachers practise actual teaching at a much earlier age than the secondary teachers.1 If a girl goes to the

centre

university at eighteen, and afterwards to a training college, she will be twenty-three before she begins practical teaching, and that is much too late. As a proof of this argument, we may state that inspectors of elementary schools sometimes find that a pupil-teacher at the end of her preparatory course at the pupil teachers' drawing our illustration from the system of the London School Board-is a far better practical teacher than when she comes away from the two years' course at a training college which follows the four or five years' preparatory work. During those two years she has lost touch with actual pupils, and it sometimes takes her very many months to regain it. It has been observed, too, that in talking to a young elementary teacher about her work, she will betray intense interest in "her children "-i.e., her pupils: a like sympathetic interest is often lacking in young secondary teachers.

Another objection to training colleges is that very often, from the nature of the work done and the kind of teachers usually employed in them, they scarcely promote in the students an interest in outside things, in current events, for example, or in general literature, art, and science. It is of the greatest importance that teachers should have outside interests, the more and the wider the better. The present headmaster of Harrow once said that schoolmastering was of necessity a somewhat narrowing profession, because it chiefly consisted in telling other people what to do. For that reason he advised his assistants to do something outside their work-to travel, or to write books. Among women teachers there is far too great a tendency to narrow their interests, and to think that

there is not time for anything beyond their daily work. Whatever means we take of training them, we should endeavour to dispel that idea. The best teachers are undoubtedly those who care for things besides teaching; and it is extraordinary what a cultivating, civilising influence such women have on their pupils even on the minds of average, not to say dull, girls. The fact that girls who go to secondary schools do not always come from cultivated or enlightened homes is not sufficiently kept in view. It may happen that in a class of girls ranging in age from fifteen to eighteen, several will not have read or heard of incidents as notorious as England's difficulties in the Transvaal or in Venezuela; others again may not have access in their homes to the most ordinary book of reference, or to any standard volume of history or poetry. It is with such girls and their parents that the teachers have to reckon—a fact that women fresh from the university and the training college are too apt to lose sight of. The decentralisation advocated in Sir John Gorst's bill would, if adopted, have done something to remove that difficulty. A very different curriculum and method of education is required in schools of the same character in different districts. It is quite possible that a system which works well at South Kensington will be less successful at Brixton. It is therefore of the greatest importance that teachers should take into account the social position, the ability, and the general environment of their pupils, things that can only be learnt by practical experience and some knowledge of the world. That capacity in a teacher, again, is not always obtainable in a training college.

women teachers obtaining a university degree.

a

The second qualification required by the council is a certificate in the theory and practice of education. This badge of distinction is again no absolute proof of efficiency. Educational experts are not yet agreed whether technical training is a necessity. That some sort of preparation is advisable is allowed by most, but what form it should take is still an open question. Training colleges offer obvious points of attack. On some minds a system of routine has a crushing and depressing effect: a knowledge of the theory of education, of metaphysics, of psychology, of hard-andfast rules of method, is not invariably helpful to the practice of teaching. It has been observed that a teacher who has been trained at a training college is able to do a particular thing in a particular way; but if when she begins work in a school as a regular teacher the head-mistress suggests that it might be well to employ a different method from that practised in the training school, she is often unwilling, if not unable, to answer the call. Another defect is to be found in the kind of practice in actual teaching obtainable by the students of a training college. It is mostly of a fictitious character: teaching in the so called practising schools attached to some of the institutions, isolated visits to schools to take a class in them, cannot teach the art of managing classes, throws no light on the details of the successful working of a school, does not aid in develop

ing resource-one of the most important and most necessary qualities of the teacher-and gives her judges and critics little or no opportunity of discovering how her personality and influence impress themselves on her pupils. The importance of character and moral force in a teacher cannot be rated too highly; it has even been said that in a day-school it is of no importance, but that is surely a fallacy. Young people imitate unconsciously the tone and bearing of those who are set over them, and from the general demeanour of a class in a school, a fairly correct judgment may always be formed of the character of the mistress at its head. What we want to know about a teacher is what is the result of her work from a mental and moral standpoint on the children under her care. In order that such result shall be satisfactory, those who intend to become teachers cannot begin too early to teach, to come into personal contact with the taught, to learn to know them, their wants and needs, and to sympathise with their difficulties and limitations. To do this effectively, more years of practice and experience are needed than life in a training college ordinarily guarantees.

It has often struck us that, as a body, the elementary women teachers, whatever their comparative deficiencies in scholarship or higher culture, are, as practical teachers, superior to the secondary teachers. The reason of the superiority is to be sought in the fact that the elementary teachers practise actual teaching at a much earlier age than the secondary teachers.1 If a girl goes to the

university at eighteen, and afterwards to a training college, she will be twenty-three before she begins practical teaching, and that is much too late. As a proof of this argument, we may state that inspectors of elementary schools sometimes find that a pupil-teacher at the end of her preparatory course at the pupil teachers' centre-drawing our illustration from the system of the London School Board is a far better practical teacher than when she comes away from the two years' course at a training college which follows the four or five years' preparatory work. During those two years she has lost touch with actual pupils, and it sometimes takes her very many months to regain it. It has been observed, too, that in talking to a young elementary teacher about her work, she will betray intense interest in "her children"-i.e., her pupils: a like sympathetic interest is often lacking in young secondary teachers.

Another objection to training colleges is that very often, from the nature of the work done and the kind of teachers usually employed in them, they scarcely promote in the students an interest in outside things, in current events, for example, or in general literature, art, and science. It is of the greatest importance that teachers should have outside interests, the more and the wider the better. The present headmaster of Harrow once said that

schoolmastering was of necessity a somewhat narrowing profession, because it chiefly consisted in telling other people what to do. For that reason he advised his assistants to do something outside their work-to travel, or to write books. Among women teachers there is far too great a tendency to narrow their interests, and to think that

for

there is not time for anything beyond their daily work. Whatever means we take of training them, we should endeavour to dispel that idea. The best teachers are undoubtedly those who care things besides teaching; and it is extraordinary what a cultivating, civilising influence such women have on their pupils—even on the minds of average, not to say dull, girls. The fact that girls who go to secondary schools do not always come from cultivated or enlightened homes is not sufficiently kept in view. It may happen that in a class of girls ranging in age from fifteen to eighteen, several will not have read or heard of incidents as notorious as England's difficulties in the Transvaal or in Venezuela; others again may not have access in their homes to the most ordinary book of reference, or to any standard volume of history or poetry. It is with such girls and their parents that the teachers have to reckon—a fact that women fresh from the university and the training college are too apt to lose sight of. The decentralisation advocated in Sir John Gorst's bill would, if adopted, have done something to remove that difficulty. A very different curriculum and method of education is required in schools of the same character in different districts. is quite possible that a system which works well at South Kensington will be less successful at Brixton. It is therefore of the greatest importance that teachers should take into account the social position, the ability, and the general environment of their pupils, things that can only be learnt by practical experience and some knowledge of the world. That capacity in a teacher, again, is not always obtainable in a training college.

It